Obama is amazing. First he gets credit for closing Gitmo—even though he leaves it open for a year and is moving the inmates to Bagram. Then he refuses to prosecute torturers. Now he’s retaining Bush’s kangaroo court system at Gitmo. When are “liberals” going to realize that our first black president is just another fascist?
Same Old, Feels Great
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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You expect us to believe they have ice tongs at Gitmo?
I've been saying stuff like this over at the Huffington Post. Unfailingly, it gets me called a racist.
Just Obama? How about his whole party? We are keeping our global torture gulag intact so we can continue a war of terror. It's scary that no one in D.C. from the party in power questions this during budget time.
Maybe you can put this in your "Left" Coast cartoon. The Green Party is agreeing with the Republicans about California's up-coming phony election on 6 veto-proof measures. Bah! The 6 measures are "the opposite of their titles" kind of measures. Written by Arnold's handlers and supported by the Democratic Party.
I'm puzzled about Obama's reasons for this. By now, I think everyone realizes that torture does not produce good information and that Bush's people used it to get "confessions" that backed up their tales of WMD and Al Queda links. But Obama doesn't need fake confessions and would not suffer politically from really shutting the prisons. So why?
Liberals are dumb. Phil Ochs said it best:
"In every political community there are varying shades of political opinion. One of the shadiest of these is the liberals. An outspoken group on many subjects. Ten degrees to the left of center in good times. Ten degrees to the right of center if it affects them personally."
Fuck us that we don't have guys like Phil Ochs around anymore.
For the life of me, I can't figure out why the Right is lashing out at the guy. He's like having McCain in office, but with less Jeopardy and a lower risk for serious injury from falling down.
Plus, the heating bill at the White House should be considerably lower.
Why are they so outspoken against Obama? Simple – if they can get people to accept the idea that Obama is a far-left socialist, then anyone to the left of Obama must be absolutely insane and undeserving of any kind of serious attention.
Blah, blah, blah, blah… I want to hear someone say what we should do with those people instead of complaining about where they are and who is holding them. The true problem lies in that we took them alive in the first place. And as far as KSM is concerned, he deserves a waterboarding every morning until the sum reaches the number of dead on 9-11 and his other attacks. 183 is a decent start.
Let's try some logic:
We are constantly told how intelligent Obama is, so it must be true, at least smarter then Bush right?
Obama continues BushCo policies
Therefore BushCo was right.
Mr Blah:
What we are "supposed" to do with them is try them publicly, convict them legally and punish them legitimately. Rule of law. Ever heard of it?
As for KSM, we'll never know what he did or did not do. If you torture someone long enough, they will tell you they started the Chicago Fire. Forced confessions are worthless. It may make you and others feel good to hear someone say "I done it", but thinking people remain troubled…
Nothing like not understanding the situation…
Rule of Law? Open your eyes. Sharia has nothing to do with Rule of Law which is the only authority most of them will consider legitimate. They make a mockery of our justice system every chance they get because it is 100% illigitimate to them. I'd like to see you tell them to place their hand on a Bible and ask them to tell the truth. Wow.
How can you say that we'll never know what KSM did or did not do? KSM admitted to planning 9-11 long before we captured him. He is proud of it. The waterboarding was to determine new plots and actionable intelligence was obtained.
Nice 'Reservoir Dogs' quote on the Chicago Fire though…
Mr. Blah, we're not talking about their law, we're talking about ours. We are supposed to be the civilized society with the moral high ground. When we act like them, we lose that. Open your own eyes.
Whether they lie on the stand or not is irrelevant. Accused generally do lie if the alternative is conviction, regardless of their religion. That's why we have a COURT OF LAW where we produce things like EVIDENCE and PROOF (more new words for you?)
The point is, how are WE acting? Do we abide by our own word, or do we just expect others to respect our Law while we wipe our asses with it whenever it becomes inconvenient?
I had no idea you were in the torture chamber when KSM broke. Because unfortunately the rest of us have just been expected to believe the "signed confession" brought out AFTER his "interrogation". Stalin relied on such confessions too.
And yeah, it's a great quote. It's also true. That's why I use it. Torture someone long enough and he'll say anything you want. Period.
By your logic, if they capture one of our soldiers, he/she should be judged by their laws because they consider themselves the civilized society with the higher moral ground, God's moral ground. How do you prove them wrong? You can't. That's the basic disagreement and why we're fighting them.
KSM admitted to planning 9-11 and other terrorist attacks prior to being captured. Prior to being captured. Prior to being captured. Clear now?(if you can be a condescending prick, so can I) They waterboarded him to learn of new plans/strategies. The method proved successful but the documentation of what criteria were used to define 'success' has not been released. There was no 'confession' because a confession was not necessary. The man is proud of his accomplishments of 9-11-01. Take that to court.
You talk about respecting our law? I'd like to take the men held at Gitmo back in time and present them to the group that wrote our Constitution. They would have been tried and executed within days but our present legal system would never allow that. My guess is you have never been shot at because Evidence and Proof are tough to gather from a battlefield. I'll take the word of the soldiers that captured those guys because, as you mentioned, we come from the society with the high moral ground and I would accept their word as proof of these 'enemy combatants' (or whatever you want to call them) guilt. I think a big difference between you and I would be that I honestly believe in my heart our men on the ground are morally superior to our enemy and I would trust them to make the best human decision regarding a detainee through the fog of war. I wouldn't expect proof like photographs of the combatant firing an AK at our people or finger prints off of the grenage that was thrown at the Humvee in order to try them. What would you have our people submit as "Evidence" and "Proof"?
As far as KSM is concerned, they could wake this guy up every morning for the rest of his life and send him back to bed every night with a waterboarding and I would still sleep sound. He is my enemy and wishes me and my country harm and I prefer him dead.
Anonymous,
nice tribal mindset you got going there, but why so many words? One might almost think you care about reasoning. Don't bother.
Anonymous,
Which Anonymous are you referring to?
Don't bother.